{"id":6019,"date":"2016-05-17T12:05:55","date_gmt":"2016-05-17T12:05:55","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/skylight.gr\/administrator_wordpress\/index.php\/2016\/05\/17\/the-last-ditches-feat-the-heartbreakers-walter-lure-a-black-sabbathrainbows-bobby-rondinelli\/"},"modified":"2016-05-17T12:05:55","modified_gmt":"2016-05-17T12:05:55","slug":"the-last-ditches-feat-the-heartbreakers-walter-lure-a-black-sabbathrainbows-bobby-rondinelli","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/skylight.gr\/index.php\/2016\/05\/17\/the-last-ditches-feat-the-heartbreakers-walter-lure-a-black-sabbathrainbows-bobby-rondinelli\/","title":{"rendered":"The Last Ditches Feat. The Heartbreakers Walter Lure & Black Sabbath\/Rainbow’s Bobby Rondinelli"},"content":{"rendered":"


Could there be two more disparate musical genres than Punk and Prog Metal? And\u2026 Could those oil and water categories ever mix? The answer\u2026 The Last Ditches\u2026A respected Prog Metal rhythm section meets ‘Real Deal’ CBGB\/Max’s Kansas City guitars and singing.
The Last Ditches sprang into being thanks to the animal cunning and persistence of Funk Metal bassist extraordinaire and studio owner, Randy Pratt. See, Randy had a deep conviction that he, along with actual no-kidding punk legend, New York’s Heartbreakers’ Walter Lure, The Planets’ long time guitarist, Binky Philips, and another genuine music icon, Rainbow and Black Sabbath’s Master Prog Metal drummer, Bobby Rondinelli, would make an amazing sound together; a blending of two rock styles that usually want nothing to do with each other\u2026It took over four years to prove his point, but, Randy was oh, so right.<\/p>\n

For those who need a remedial, Walter Lure was \u201cthe other guitarist\u201d in Johnny Thunders’ Heartbreakers, rightly considered one of the Top Five All Time Great Punk bands. While the toxically charismatic Johnny took up most of the spotlight, Walter’s guitar playing made up the bulk of the band’s incredible music, as did Walter’s songwriting. To wrap Walter’s justified legend up in one neat sentence\u2026 \u201cWalter Lure also played un-credited guitar on four albums by The Ramones\u201d.<\/p>\n

Ask any serious drummer playing arena-recording level drums and they will all not only know who Bobby Rondinelli is, chances are, they own some of his world famous instructional DVDs. World Famous is not glib here. Mr. Rondinelli travels the globe giving sold out drumming seminars in Tokyo, London, Scandinavia, Moscow\u2026 In addition to Bobby being a member of Ritchie Blackmore’s Rainbow for their albums \u201cDifficult to Cure\u201d (1981), \u201cStraight Between the Eyes\u201d (1982) and \u201cFinyl Vinyl\u201d (1986), Bobby recorded and toured with Black Sabbath on and for the \u201cCross Purposes\u201d album and two albums and one DVD with Blue Oyster Cult, easily three of the all time most influential Metal bands. Mr. Rondinelli’s other recordings number in the literal hundreds.<\/p>\n

Binky and Randy are decades-long veterans of the New York City Music Scene. Randy played with the likes of The Funky Knights and is currently the harpist in the reconstituted Cactus, yes, that Cactus, and the internationally acclaimed funk-metal band, The Lizards. Meanwhile, Binky, who, back in the day, shared NYC stages with The New York Dolls, KISS, The Ramones, Blondie, et al, has stuck to his Planets guns all this time while writing a weekly column for Huffington Post. Tommy Ramone even called Binky \u201ca virtuoso\u201d.<\/p>\n

Every aspect of The Last Ditches’ music (Walter Lure came up with the name), are extraordinarily successful examples of kitsch painter, Bob Ross’s Happy Accident approach to art. All thirteen songs on \u201cSpilt Milk\u201d were learned on the spot in the studio and recorded the moment \u201cthe ducks lined up\u201d. Adding to the immediacy of the basic tracks, in every case, all the many guitar overdubs were cut with nothing worked out in advance, ever. What Walter and Binky achieved was almost entirely by instinct, attitude, and a strong musical empathy. This is music for Guitar Freaks. Bobby and Randy laid down over-the-top granite-hard fist-tight foundations for Walter and Binky’s careening guitars and voices. The band’s dear pal, Paul Gifford, added gorgeous harmony vocals.<\/p>\n

Eight of the thirteen songs recorded were written by Walter and Binky and Randy, expressly for the \u201cSpilt Milk\u201d album. The remaining five cuts are from untapped back catalog.<\/p>\n

It is The Last Ditches’ great good fortune (and yours) that this project was headed up by the dazzling Master Engineer, JZ Barrell (who shares Producer credit with Binky) behind the recording console. The band’s magic might have been accidental, JZ’s was emphatically not. The truth is, everything took so damn long and at times seemed to be happening in a vacuum, that The Last Ditches themselves had no idea they had recorded such an utterly visceral and exciting rock and roll album until JZ finished it.<\/p>\n

Okay, it’s time for you (and your neighbors) to enjoy this music.<\/p>\n

The Last Ditches \u201cSpilt Milk\u201d will be released on Hyperspace \/ Rocker Records: https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/Hyperspace-Records-158124194256116\/<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

Source: Hyperspace Records<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Could there be two more disparate musical genres than Punk and Prog Metal? And\u2026 Could…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6019","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-music-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/skylight.gr\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6019","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/skylight.gr\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/skylight.gr\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/skylight.gr\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/skylight.gr\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6019"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/skylight.gr\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6019\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/skylight.gr\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6019"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/skylight.gr\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6019"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/skylight.gr\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6019"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}